Peter Frohmader - Homunculus
- 🎬 Video
- ℹ️ Published 10 months ago
Published 10 months ago
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Peter Frohmader was an impressive talent of composition and orchestration. His gothic nightmares Nekropolis (1981), Cultes Des Goules (1985) and Ritual (1986), particularly the middle one, credited to Nekropolis established his credentials in manipulating electronic and acoustic sounds, and in creating claustrophobic atmospheres. The four-part electronic symphony Homunculus (1988) shifted gear and attained the menacing intensity of a futuristic vision.
This trend towards a chamber electronic music climaxed with the four parts of Homunculus, that were released on vol. 1 (Multimood, 1987), containing the first two parts (composed in 1985), and vol. 2 (Multimood, 1988), containing the last two parts (composed in 1986-87). Here, gothic and futuristic elements fuse and yield a music that shuns tonal centers, embraces stochastic rhythm, downplays the role of consonance to mere ornament. The basic pattern is almost always the symphonic metamorphosis, that transforms a quiet ouverture in an apocalypse of terrible sounds.
Each part is extremely rich of events, hardly related to contemporary techniques of static contemplation. The music is both highly dramatic and highly dynamic. Each part is, basically, a symphony in its own. The first part opens with a sinister atmosphere for flute, piano and background drones. As the flute intones a gentle psalm, the piano hits furiously. The interplay climaxes in a quasi-orchestral crescendo that leads to folkish melodic themes. Drums and choir opens the last nine minutes, which, for a while, indulge in a dreamy mood. A frantic scherzo, built upon minimalistic lines a` la Michael Nyman, drives the last four minutes.
The second part opens with a soprano voice floating above loud and aggressive violin drones and thundering piano clusters. The rhythmic attack increases when the drums enter the scene, while the violins turn into screeching animals, thus creating a nightmarish convulsion. Chaos increases as beats and dissonances rule the piece for a few minutes. Then out of the chaos there comes a series of overlapping and iterative keyboard patterns. Again, Michael Nyman is the inspiration for resurrecting the music, that furiously rises until self-destructing.
The third part opens with a sorrowful melody and a steady beat. The rhythmic charge carries on into a gypsy motif, drowned in a jungle of sounds. After seven minutes the music dissolves into floating galactic dust. That eventually coalesces into a gothic choir and massive drones. The rhythm returns loud and frantic, sustaining disconnected phrases by a saxophone. Ghostly voices roam the wasteland of the last four minutes.
After a brief ouverture, the fourth part delves into a cascade of rhythmic patterns. The intensity keeps increasing. Even when it finally subsides, this is the busiest of the four parts, continuously rebuilding walls of sounds as they are destroyed. It concludes with an apocalypotic march of the damned, a female choir battling an army of androids.
Frohmader died in 2022 at the age of 63.
Tracklist:
A Homunculus Part 1 00:00
B Homunculus Part 2 22:21
C Homunculus Part 3 44:09
D Homunculus Part 4 1:08:20
Peter Frohmader was an impressive talent of composition and orchestration. His gothic nightmares Nekropolis (1981), Cultes Des Goules (1985) and Ritual (1986), particularly the middle one, credited to Nekropolis established his credentials in manipulating electronic and acoustic sounds, and in creating claustrophobic atmospheres. The four-part electronic symphony Homunculus (1988) shifted gear and attained the menacing intensity of a futuristic vision.
This trend towards a chamber electronic music climaxed with the four parts of Homunculus, that were released on vol. 1 (Multimood, 1987), containing the first two parts (composed in 1985), and vol. 2 (Multimood, 1988), containing the last two parts (composed in 1986-87). Here, gothic and futuristic elements fuse and yield a music that shuns tonal centers, embraces stochastic rhythm, downplays the role of consonance to mere ornament. The basic pattern is almost always the symphonic metamorphosis, that transforms a quiet ouverture in an apocalypse of terrible sounds.
Each part is extremely rich of events, hardly related to contemporary techniques of static contemplation. The music is both highly dramatic and highly dynamic. Each part is, basically, a symphony in its own. The first part opens with a sinister atmosphere for flute, piano and background drones. As the flute intones a gentle psalm, the piano hits furiously. The interplay climaxes in a quasi-orchestral crescendo that leads to folkish melodic themes. Drums and choir opens the last nine minutes, which, for a while, indulge in a dreamy mood. A frantic scherzo, built upon minimalistic lines a` la Michael Nyman, drives the last four minutes.
The second part opens with a soprano voice floating above loud and aggressive violin drones and thundering piano clusters. The rhythmic attack increases when the drums enter the scene, while the violins turn into screeching animals, thus creating a nightmarish convulsion. Chaos increases as beats and dissonances rule the piece for a few minutes. Then out of the chaos there comes a series of overlapping and iterative keyboard patterns. Again, Michael Nyman is the inspiration for resurrecting the music, that furiously rises until self-destructing.
The third part opens with a sorrowful melody and a steady beat. The rhythmic charge carries on into a gypsy motif, drowned in a jungle of sounds. After seven minutes the music dissolves into floating galactic dust. That eventually coalesces into a gothic choir and massive drones. The rhythm returns loud and frantic, sustaining disconnected phrases by a saxophone. Ghostly voices roam the wasteland of the last four minutes.
After a brief ouverture, the fourth part delves into a cascade of rhythmic patterns. The intensity keeps increasing. Even when it finally subsides, this is the busiest of the four parts, continuously rebuilding walls of sounds as they are destroyed. It concludes with an apocalypotic march of the damned, a female choir battling an army of androids.
Frohmader died in 2022 at the age of 63.
Tracklist:
A Homunculus Part 1 00:00
B Homunculus Part 2 22:21
C Homunculus Part 3 44:09
D Homunculus Part 4 1:08:20
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